#110: Beyond the Boogieman—Part II

EXCERPT:
Even before 9/11, the man who would become Benedict XVI knew the dangers of religious fanaticism. In his book Salt of the Earth he said that while faith was intended for simple people, “The quest for certainty and simplicity becomes dangerous when it leads to fanaticism and narrow mindedness. When reason as such becomes suspect, then faith itself becomes falsified.”

Such fanaticism is not limited, of course, to Islam – there are Christian and Jewish fanatics as well. So when terror hit American shores on 9/11, the future Pope made it immediately clear that a “Boogieman” response to 9/11 would be wrong: “It is important not to attribute simplistically what happened on September 11 to Islam. It would be a great error.”

Benedict has no truck with the “Boogieman” mentality that sees threats everywhere in Islam. He has no interest in the kind of Islamophobia that has crept into American political discourse. Nor does he subscribe to scaring Christians into action by demonizing some evil force. Yet such paranoid demonizing has been chronic in America for more than 50 years. So Benedict’s vision is as challenging to American Catholics as it is to Muslims.

Upon his election, the Pope made a point of mentioning Muslims in an address the day after his installation mass:

"I am particularly grateful for the presence in our midst of members of the Muslim community, and I express my appreciation for the growth of dialogue between Muslims and Christians, both at the local and international level. I assure you that the church wants to continue building bridges of friendship with the followers of all religions."

And during World Youth Day, Benedict’s August 20 address to German-based Muslims left no mistaking his view about the importance of good Christian-Muslim relations. “Inter-religious and intercultural dialogue between Christians and Muslims,” he said, “cannot be reduced to an optional extra. It is in fact a vital necessity, on which enlargement of measure our future depends.”

To assure his listeners that this was not mere personal opinion, the Pope quoted Vatican Council II (where Joseph Ratzinger, not yet a bishop, served as theological consultant):

“The Church looks upon Muslims with respect. They worship the one God living and subsistent, merciful and almighty, creator of heaven and earth, who has spoken to humanity and to whose decrees…they seek to submit themselves whole-heartedly, just as Abraham, to whom the Islamic faith readily relates itself, submitted to God.”

And to show that his vision was neither ignorant nor naïve, the Pope again cited Vatican II’s acknowledgement of the stormy past relations between Christianity and Islam:

“Although considerable dissensions and enmities between Christians and Muslims may have arisen in the course of the centuries, the Council urges all parties that, forgetting past things, they train themselves towards sincere mutual understanding and together maintain and promote social justice and moral values as well as peace and freedom for all people.”